THE  TRENT  AFFAIR 


AN    AFTERMATH 


BY 
RICHARD   HENRY  DANA 


CAMBRIDGE 
1912 


FROJ£    JAMES    D.   HARTS 
0F    BO-OK6 


JHENEY      DANA,     JUNIOR 


THE  TRENT  AFFAIR 


AN    AFTERMATH 


BY 

RICHARD   HENRY  DANA 


CAMBRIDGE 

1912 


FROM  THE 

PROCEEDINGS  OF  THE  MASSACHUSETTS  HISTORICAL  SOCIETY 
FOR  MARCH,  1912 


THE  TRENT  AFFAIR  — AN  AFTERMATH. 


ON  November  Qth  last  our  President,  Mr.  Charles  Francis 
Adams,  read  a  paper  on  the  Trent  Affair,  taking  the  occasion  of 
its  fiftieth  anniversary.1 

During  the  Civil  War  Captain  Charles  Wilkes  of  the  United 
States  navy,  in  command  of  the  San  Jacinto,  a  United  States 
war  vessel,  took  from  off  the  Trent,  a  British  mail  steamer  run 
ning  between  Havana  in  the  island  of  Cuba  and  the  island  of 
St.  Thomas,  both  neutral  ports,  Messrs.  Mason  and  Slidell, 
two  Confederate  envoys  sent  out  respectively  to  England 
and  France,  with  their  secretaries.  This  occurred  on  the  8th 
of  November,  1861.  It  was  done  without  any  authority  or 
knowledge  on  the  part  of  the  United  States  government.2 
Messrs.  Mason  and  Slidell  had  various  despatches  which  were 
successfully  concealed  on  the  Trent;  but  the  envoys  were 
taken  off  and  the  Trent  was  allowed  to  go  on  her  way.  Messrs. 
Mason  and  Slidell  were  taken  as  prisoners  in  the  San  Jacinto 
to  Fortress  Monroe,  November  15,  and  later  moved  to  Fort 
Warren  in  Boston  Harbor.  The  news  reached  Washington, 
Saturday,  November  16.  The  seizure  was  first  known  in  Eng 
land,  November  27,  on  the  arrival  at  Southampton  of  the  pas 
sengers  of  the  Trent.  The  news  excited  great  rejoicing  in  the 
United  States  and  intense  indignation  in  Great  Britain.  One 
cause  for  the  rejoicing  at  the  North  was  that  Mason  was  the 
author  of  the  fugitive  slave  law  and  chiefly  responsible  for  the 
decision  of  Virginia  to  secede.  As  Mr.  Adams  reminds  us, 
there  was  no  transatlantic  cable  in  operation  during  the  affair. 
It  took  from  twelve  to  fourteen  days  for  news  to  be  carried  be 
tween  Great  Britain  and  the  United  States. 

1  See  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proceedings,  XLV.  35. 

2  For  fuller  account,  see  Mr.  Adams'  paper,  and  Harris,  The  Trent  Ajfair, 
91-115. 


Mr.  Adams  gives  an  account  of  how  he,  a  youthful  legal 
practitioner  of  twenty-six,  after  reading  the  announcement  on 
the  bulletin  boards,  hurried  into  the  office  of  Mr.  Richard 
H.  Dana,  Jr.,  with  whom  he  had  recently  studied  law,  bear 
ding  the  startling  news.  As  Mr.  Adams  says,  "Mr.  Dana  was 
deemed  as  high  an  authority  on  maritime  law  as  there  was  at 
the  American  bar."  "Well  do  I  remember,"  says  Mr.  Adams, 
"his  reception  of  it.  His  face  lighted  up,  and,  clapping 
his  hands  with  satisfaction  over  the  tidings,  he  expressed  his 
emphatic  approval  of  the  act,  adding  that  he  would  risk  his 
\  '  professional  reputation'  on  its  legality."  1 

It  seems  quite  clear  that  Mr.  Adams  thinks  Mr.  Dana's 
opinion  as  to  the  legality  of  the  act  "did  not  have  ...  a 
justifying  leg  to  stand  upon."  It  is  enough  of  an  answer  in 
order  to  sustain  Mr.  Dana's  opinion  to  quote  from  the  letter 
written  by  Lord  Palmerston  to  J.  T.  Delane,  the  editor  of  the 
Times,  on  November  n,  1861,  just  after  the  affair  had  taken 
place,  but  before  the  news  of  it  had  reached  England,  and 
which  is  given  in  full  in  Mr.  Adams'  paper: 

94  PICCADILLY,  November  n,  1861. 

MY  DEAR  DELANE,  —  It  may  be  useful  to  you  to  know  that  the 
Chancellor,  Dr.  Lushington,  the  three  Law  Officers,  Sir  G.  Grey, 
the  Duke  of  Somerset,  and  myself,  met  at  the  Treasury  today  to 
consider  what  we  could  properly  do  about  the  American  cruiser, 
come,  no  doubt,  to  search  the  West  Indian  packet  supposed  to  be 
bringing  hither  the  two  Southern  envoys;  and,  much  to  my  regret, 
it  appeared  that,  according  to  the  principles  of  international  law 
laid  down  in  our  courts  by  Lord  Stowell,  and  practised  and  en 
forced  by  us,  a  belligerent  has  a  right  to  stop  and  search  any  neutral 
not  being  a  ship  of  war,  and  being  found  on  the  high  seas  and  being 
suspected  of  carrying  enemy's  despatches;  and  that  consequently 
this  American  cruiser  might,  by  our  own  principles  of  international 
law,  stop  the  West  Indian  packet,  search  her,  and  if  the  Southern 
men  and  their  despatches  and  credentials  were  found  on  board, 
either  take  them  out,  or  seize  the  packet  and  carry  her  back  to  New 
York  for  trial. 

The  Chancellor  was  Lord  Westbury,  and  he  and  Dr.  Lushing 
ton,  the  celebrated  Admiralty  Judge,  constituted  with  the 
Law  Officers  the  highest  authority  in  England  at  that  time 
on  international  law. 

1  P.  48,  supra. 


I  should  note  that  during  all  the  affair,  till  the  prisoners 
were  delivered  up,  and  in  which  period,  as  Mr.  Adams  says, 
almost  every  one  in  the  United  States  was  carried  off  his  feet, 
and  so  many  holding  prominent  positions  openly  lent  their 
names  to  the  discussion,  Mr.  Dana  never  appeared  before  the 
public  as  committing  himself  on  the  subject.  His  first  public 
utterance  to  which  his  name  was  attached  was  in  support  of 
the  rendition  and  of  the  chief  ground  on  which  that  was  made. 
In  the  casual  and  private  conversation  with  his  recent  law- 
student,  he  must  have  meant,  even  if  he  did  not  say  so,  legal 
according  to  British  precedent.  Mr.  Dana  was  far  too  good 
an  authority,  and  was  far  too  familiar  with  the  War  of  1812 
and  its  causes,  not  to  know  that  the  United  States  denied 
England's  right  to  take  men  (not  in  enemy's  military  service) 
from  neutral  vessels.  He  was  far  too  familiar  with  the  efforts 
of  his  grandfather,  Francis  Dana,  when  Minister  to  Russia 
(though  not  officially  accepted  at  court),  during  the  latter  part 
of  the  Revolutionary  War,  in  concert  with  American  envoys 
to  other  courts,  to  work  up  European  nations  on  that  subject, 
not  to  know  that  other  countries  beside  the  United  States 
were  opposed  to  England's  principles. 

Under  these  principles  Great  Britain  had  forcibly  taken  from 
neutral  vessels  her  own  subjects,  or  those  she  claimed  or  thought 
to  be  her  own  subjects,  even  though  they  were  rendering  no 
unneutral  service,  and  even  when  the  neutral  vessel  was 
going  from  one  neutral  port  to  another,  and  regardless 
whether  the  men  were  seamen  or  passengers,1  and  for  the 
sole  purpose  of  securing  their  allegiance  or  service.  This,  as 
all  authorities  agree,  was  a  claim  of  police  authority  on  the 
high  seas,  and  was  not  founded  on  the  doctrine  of  belligerent 
acts  of  neutrals.2 

Messrs.  Mason  and  Slidell  were  still  "citizens"  of  the  United 
States.3  The  independence  of  the  Southern  Confederacy  had 

1  Two  nephews  of  General  Washington  were  taken  from  a  neutral  vessel  by  a 
British  man-of-war  on  the  supposition  that  they  were  Englishmen. 

2  Dana,  Wheaton,  175  n,  646  n. 

3  See  United  States  Constitution  Preamble.     "We  the  people  of  the  United 
States  ...  do  ordain  and  establish  this  CONSTITUTION";   Art.  I,  §  2,  par.  2  and 
§  3,  par.  3  provide  that  a  United  States  senator  or  representative  must  be  "a  citizen 
of  the  United  States"  and  "be  an  inhabitant  of  that  State"  for  or  in  which  he  is 
chosen.     By  Art.  VI,  par.  3,  United  States  "Senators  and  representatives  .  .  . 
shall  be  bound  by  oath  or  affirmation  to  support  this  constitution."     Both  Mr. 
Mason  and  Mr.  Slidell  had  been  United  States  Senators. 


not  been  recognized  by  a  single  nation,  and,  under  the  British 
principles,  we  could  take  them  out  as  our  citizens  to  secure 
their  allegiance,  to  say  nothing  of  the  fact  that  their  despatches, 
vwe  now  know,  included  military  and  belligerent  matter.1  But 
it  is  contended  in  Mr.  Adams'  paper  that  England  had  aban 
doned  her  right  of  impressment,  as  it  was  called,  for  fifty  years. 
Some  writers  in  the  English  magazines,  to  justify  England's 
inconsistent  attitude,  made  that  claim,  to  be  sure;  but  no  such 
writer  ever  made  any  such  claim  before  the  Trent  Affair  was 
known  in  England.2  Is  that  abandonment  view  well  sus 
tained?  Not  only  in  1814  and  again  in  1818  did  England  refuse 
to  abandon  her  claim,  but  in  the  correspondence  between 
Mr.  Webster  and  Lord  Ashburton  in  1842  she  again  refused; 
and  in  the  Declaration  of  Paris,  in  1856,  which  adopted  for  the 
leading  European  nations  new  articles  on  the  rights  of  neu 
trals,  she  would  not  abandon  her  claim;  and  as  late  as  Decem 
ber,  1860,  President  Buchanan  in  his  message  to  Congress 
said  that  "the  claim  on  the  part  of  Great  Britain  forcibly  to 
visit  and  search  American  vessels  on  the  high  seas  in  time  of 
peace  has  been  abandoned,"  referring  to  the  old  claim  of  1812. 
This  shows  that  she  still  claimed  it  in  time  of  war;  and  Lord 
Palmerston's  letter  of  November  n,  1861,  two  days  after  the 
seizure  above  referred  to,  still  held  to  the  old  view. 

So  far,  I  have  been  speaking,  as  my  father  spoke  privately 
to  his  young  friend  and  wrote  confidentially  to  Mr.  Adams 
in  London,  from  the  point  of  view  of  a  lawyer.  In  Mr.  Adams' 
recent  paper  it  is  asserted  that  we  had  outgrown  any  such 
principle.  We  surely  had  in  America;  but  even  if  England 
had  outgrown  it,  she  had  not  admitted  it  nor  changed  her  law. 
She  came  forward,  however,  as  prosecuting  officer  to  enforce 
within  her  own  jurisdiction  new  rules  which  she  adopted  only 
after  the  seizure,  —  a  clear  case  of  ex  post  facto  law,  on  her 
part.3 

1  Mr.  Dana,  in  his  letter  of  November  25  to  Mr.  Adams,  speaks  of  their  "mis 
sion"  being  "hostile,"  but  to  take  them  off  the  neutral  vessel  could  be  justified 
only  on  the  English  principles.    See  also  notes  on  p.  7,  infra. 

2  The  London  Times  made  this  claim  the  day  after  (viz.  on  the  28th)  and  still 
more  emphatically  on  the  2gth  and  3oth  of  November,  1861. 

3  If  we  should  have  consented  to  play  the  war  game  under  the  British  rules, 
was  it  sportsmanlike  in  Great  Britain  to  change  her  rules  after  we  had  scored 
a  point  and  insist  on  enforcing  as  against  us  this  change?    It  may  have  been  and 
was  good  policy  for  us  to  accept  the  change  on  her  part,  but  was  it  fair  for  her  to 
act  as  she  did  ? 


To  the  question  of  whether,  aside  from  the  English  principles, 
Messrs.  Mason  and  Slidell  could  be  taken  off  the  Trent,  or 
whether  the  Trent  could  properly  have  been  taken  to  a  United 
States  port  and  condemned  by  a  prize  court,  I  shall  not  enter  in 
so  short  a  paper  further  than  to  remark  that  a  second  opinion 
of  the  British  Law  Officers,  modifying  their  first  one  of  De 
cember  n,  was  in  favor  of  the  right  to  condemn  the  Trent  if 
taken  to  a  prize  court;  though  still  later,  on  January  23, 
1862,  after  the  return  of  the  prisoners,  this  was  denied.1  As  a 

1  The  text-books  at  the  time  generally  admitted  the  right  to  stop  the  am-  - 
bassador  of  an  enemy  on  his  passage  (Wheaton,  §  504;  Phillimore,  368,  §  27, 
369-374).  This  was  based  on  the  authority  of  Lord  Stowell;  but  that  opinion 
of  Stowell's  was  obiter  dictum,  and  the  famous  passage  from  Vattel  misapplied. 
See  Dana,  Wheaton,  641  n;  Harris,  249.  Sir  William  Scott's  (Lord  Stowell) 
celebrated  dictum  reads  as  follows:  "You  may  stop  the  ambassador  of  your 
enemy  on  his  passage.  Despatches  are  not  less  clearly  contraband,  and  their 
bearers  fall  under  the  same  condemnation;  .  .  .  when  it  is  of  sufficient  import 
ance  to  the  enemy  that  persons  shall  be  sent  on  the  public  service  at  the  public 
expense,  it  is  only  reasonable  that  it  should  afford  equal  ground  of  forfeiture 
against  a  vessel  that  it  has  been  let  out  for  a  purpose  so  intimately  connected  with 
hostile  operations."  Dana,  Wheaton,  645  n.  VatteFs  statement,  on  which  this 
dictum  is  based,  clearly  refers  to  the  right  to  stop  outgoing  ambassadors  on  the 
territory  or  vessels  of  either  party  to  the  war,  and  not  on  neutral  territory  or 
vessels. 

The  claim  of  the  Duke  of  Argyll  that  the  termini  being  neutral  ports  wholly 
exonerates  the  Trent  and  which  Mr.  Adams  sustains  in  his  paper,  is  not  well 
founded  in  International  Law.  The  neutrality  of  the  termini  has  an  important 
bearing  on  the  weight  of  evidence  required  for  condemnation  but  is  not  conclu 
sive  of  innocence.  It  is  a  question  of  the  ultimate  destiny.  See  Dana,  Wheaton, 
652  n,  667  «;  also  the  Declaration  of  London  (1909),  Art.  30,  and  Wilson  and 
Tucker,  International  Law  (1909),  339.  If  we  had  had  a  right  to  take  off  the 
envoys  at  all,  it  was  not  necessary  that  the  voyage  should  have  been  a  "  continuous  " 
one  from  an  enemy's  port  to  sustain  that  right. 

For  an  instance  where  an  attempt  was  made  to  take  an  enemy's  ambassador 
from  a  neutral  vessel  going  from  one  neutral  port  to  another,  we  have  the  case  of 
the  British  war  ship  Africa  which  in  1 795  entered  American  waters  for  the  avowed 
intention  of  seizing  M.  Fauchet,  the  French  minister  to  the  United  States.  He 
was  on  board  the  packet  Peggy,  a  neutral  American  vessel  going  from  New  York 
to  Newport,  R.  I.,  but  hearing  of  the  intention  of  the  commander  of  the  Africa 
he  left  the  Peggy  at  Stonington.  The  Peggy  was  stopped,  boarded,  and  thoroughly 
searched  from  the  Africa,  and  great  disappointment  was  shown  on  account  of 
the  absence  of  M.  Fauchet.  The  British  vice-consul  at  Newport  aided  in  the 
matter.  See  Harris,  278;  Senate  Executive  Document,  No.  4,  3d  Session,  37th 
Congress. 

Mr.  Adams  in  his  paper,  arguing  against  the  acts  of  Commodore  Wilkes, 
speaks  of  the  absurdity  of  such  right  of  search  in  modern  times,  instancing  the 
possible  stopping  of  the  Lusitania  or  the  Oceanic  by  a  Mexican  or  Portuguese 
battleship.  It  may  be  remarked  that  although  carrying  envoys  and  diplomatic 
despatches  is  not  to-day  belligerent  service,  yet  the  Declaration  of  London  of 
1909,  signed  on  behalf  of  the  ten  chief  maritime  powers  of  the  world  and  purporting 


\ 


8 

minor  matter,  I  may  state  in  passing  that  the  claim  in  Mr. 
Adams'  paper  that  it  was  absurd  to  class  Messrs.  Mason  and  Sli- 
dell  as  envoys,  as  they  were  only  private  citizens,  is  not  upheld 
by  Lord  Russell,  who  in  his  letter  to  Lord  Lyons  of  January 
23,  1862,  replying  to  Seward's  letter  of  December  26,  claimed 
that  these  gentlemen  and  their  despatches  had  the  protection 
of  ambassadors,  on  the  ground  that  they  were  envoys  from 
a  de  facto  state  whose  belligerency  was  generally  recognized. 

Now,  from  the  point  of  view  of  statesmanship,  Mr.  Adams, 
our  Minister  to  England,  was  wholly  right,  and  deserves,  as  he 
does  for  his  many  other  acts  during  the  trying  period  when 
he  was  in  London,  the  highest  praise.  This  Mr.  Dana  very 
properly  acknowledged  in  his  letter  to  Mr.  Adams  of  Janu 
ary  19,  1862,  written  after  the  surrender,  saying,  "You  saw  the 
question  as  a  statesman,  I  only  as  a  lawyer."  Indeed,  Mr. 
Dana  did  not  discuss  the  advisability  of  surrendering  the 
men  regardless  of  the  English  law,  but  discussed  only  our 
legal  rights.  I  wish  to  point  out  that  Mr.  Dana  in  this  letter 
made  no  admission  that  he  was  wrong  as  to  the  British  prin 
ciples  of  law  then  in  force.  Mr.  Adams  had  had  no  controversy 
with  Mr.  Dana  on  that  point.  He  admitted  it,  when  he  called 
those  principles  "cast-off  rags,"  recently  "cast-off"  only,  as 
Mr.  Adams  said,  "because  the  sin  had  become  inconvenient." 
Mr.  Dana  was  not  acting  in  a  position  of  responsibility.  To 
illustrate  how  that  may  affect  one,  let  me  recall  that  in  1867, 
when  Mr.  Dana  was  retained  by  the  United  States  Govern 
ment  as  counsel  for  the  trial  of  Jefferson  Davis  for  high  treason, 
after  giving  the  law  and  showing  how  an  impartial  jury  might 
legally  be  selected,  perhaps  from  the  State  of  Pennsylvania 
where  Davis'  troops  had  been  righting,  he  took  the  view  of  the 
statesman  and  not  of  the  lawyer,  and  strongly  recommended  as 

to  state  "the  generally  recognized  principles  of  international  law,"  allows  on  mere 
suspicion  the  right  of  stoppage,  visit,  and  search,  resistance  to  which  would 
subject  the  vessel  and  her  owner's  goods  to  condemnation.  Some  instances  of 
belligerent  service  are,  carrying  an  individual  embodied  in  the  armed  force  of  an 
enemy,  or  contraband  goods,  which  are  carefully  defined,  or  making  a  voyage 
"with  a  view  to  the  transmission  of  information  in  the  interest  of  the  enemy," 
or  with  knowledge  of  the  owner  "transporting  one  or  more  persons  who,  during 
the  voyage,  lend  assistance  to  the  operations  of  the  enemy";  and  the  fact  that 
the  voyage  is  from  one  neutral  port  to  another  is  no  defence  if  the  ultimate  des 
tination  is  for  the  enemy.  See  Wilson  and  Tucker,  International  Law,  450- 
468. 


the  wisest  and  best  policy  for  the  future  of  our  reunited  country 
the  release  of  Mr.  Davis. 

Mr.  Sumner's  great  speech  in  the  Senate  upholding  the\ 
return  was  made  on  January  12,  just  two  weeks  after  Mason  and 
Slidell  had  been  given  up.  Before  that  date  Mr.  Dana,  who 
was  in  Washington  to  argue  a  case  before  the  Supreme  Court 
and  to  consult  regarding  the  prize  cases,  had  become  thor 
oughly  converted  to  the  extra-legal  view  of  accepting  England's 
demand  as  an  abandonment  of  her  old  principles,  surrender 
ing  the  prisoners  on  that  ground,  and  thus  establishing  our  views 
of  what  the  law  ought  to  be.  I  have  the  most  distinct  recollec 
tion  of  his  return  and  of  his  enthusiasm  for  this  the  chief  ground 
on  which  the  return  was  made,  and  of  Seward's  letter,1  as,  in 
the  main,  a  statesmanlike  paper. 

As  to  the  threats  of  war  by  Great  Britain  and  her  "  bullying 
attitude"  and  Mr.  Dana's  comments  on  this  phase  of  the 
"Affair"  in  his  notes  to  Wheaton,  the  recent  paper  of  our 
President  truly  says,  Mr.  Dana  made  the  mistake  of  saying  that 
"The  news  of  the  capture  of  Messrs.  Mason  and  Slidell  reached 
Washington  about  the  same  time  it  reached  London," 2  and 
then  adds,  "the  error  vitiates  Mr.  Dana's  whole  criticism." 
Strangely  enough,  the  dates  of  the  facts  which  Mr.  Adams 
cites,  when  examined  in  their  turn,  vitiate  Mr.  Adams'  vitia 
tion,  if  one  bears  in  mind  the  absence  of  the  Atlantic  cable. 
The  news  of  the  seizure  reached  Washington  Saturday,  Novem 
ber  i6,3  and  London,  November  27,  or  eleven  days  later.  The 
threats  of  war  in  England  were  made  immediately  in  public 
meetings  and  in  the  press.4  Preparations  for  war  were  begun 
at  once,  "on  a  scale  which  was  sufficient  to  tax  the  utmost 
resources  of  the  United  Kingdom,"  5  with  work  day,  night, 
and  Sundays;  troops  were  immediately  ordered  to  Canada, 
cannon  bought,  the  navy  put  on  a  war  footing,  a  shipment  of 

1  Lothrop,  William  H.  Seward,  302;  and  Dana  to  Adams,  p.  131,  supra.   Letters 
show  that  Mr.  Dana  was  in  Washington  from  about  January  2  to  the  isth, 
1862. 

2  Mr.  Dana's  conclusion  that  "each  side  [was]  acting  without  hearing  from 
the  other"  till  the  very  last  (655  ri)  is,  however,  true,  as  shown  below. 

3  Too  late  for  more  than  a  mere  notice  in  the  Saturday  evening  papers.    The 
rejoicing  did  not  appear  till  Monday,  the  i8th. 

4  The  Liverpool  meeting  of  "indignation"  at  the  "outrage  on  the  British  flag" 
was  held  at  3  P.  M.  on  the  afternoon  of  the  27th.    Harris,  146;  London  Times, 
November  28,  1861.  5  Harris,  141. 


10 

saltpetre  to  the  United  States  Government  stopped,  a  letter 
written  to  the  Canadian  authorities  to  prepare  for  war,  and  a 
peremptory  demand  made  to  the  United  States  to  be  answered 
in  seven  days,  with  the  alternative  of  the  withdrawal  of  the 
British  Minister  from  Washington,  —  all  consummated  by 
the  3oth  of  November.1  Now,  Mr.  Adams  gives  it  as  the  excuse 
or  this  warlike  and  "bullying"  attitude  that  England  had 
been  aroused  by  the  events  in  America  during  the  eleven  days 
between  November  16  and  27.  But  it  took  twelve  days  for 
news  to  go  from  New  York  to  London.  The  i6th  was  Saturday. 
An  examination  of  the  United  States  newspapers  shows  that 
only  a  brief  and  somewhat  incorrect  statement  appeared  that 
afternoon,  with  no  editorials.  There  were  no  Sunday  papers. 
The  first  " rejoicings"  appear  in  the  United  States  papers  of 
Monday,  the  i8th.  There  were  no  Monday  or  Tuesday  sailings. 
News  of  Wednesday  the  2oth  would  not  arrive  in  London  till 
about  December  2.  Now,  let  us  turn  to  the  London  Times. 
Its  files  show  that  not  even  the  news  of  the  first  popular,  unoffi 
cial  " rejoicings"  had  reached  London  by  the  eventful  3oth, — 
the  day  of  war  preparations  begun  and  peremptory  demand 
sent.  The  Times  of  the  3oth  states :  "The  public  advices  by  this 
arrival  [the  last  from  the  United  States]  do  not  mention  the 
arrival  of  the  San  Jacinto  at  any  American  port."  The  first 
news  of  the  "rejoicings"  appears  in  the  Times  of  December 
3,2  brought  by  steamer  leaving  New  York  November  20.  So 
Mr.  Adams7  words  "about  the  same  time,"  referring  to  news 
of  our  "rejoicings"  and  "slopping  over"  reaching  England 
when  she  first  heard  of  the  seizure,  also  need  to  be  changed. 

The  chief  events  Mr.  Adams  refers  to  in  this  connection 
were  the  indiscreet  speeches  of  the  Governor  of  Massachu 
setts,  the  Chief  Justice  of  the  State,  and  others  at  the  Wilkes 

1  Bancroft,  Seward,  n.  226,  227.    See  also  London  Times,  November  30,  p.  9. 
The  royal  order  preventing  the  shipment  of  any  saltpetre  to  the  United  States, 
as  the  London  Times,  December  2,  said,  "to  prevent  a  power  so  arrogant  and  so 
much  under  the  influence  of  passion  from  obtaining  materials  of  war  which  may 
hereafter  be  turned  against  us,"  was  dated  November  30.    The  transport  Mel- 
borne  was  chartered  for  troops  and  war  material  to  be  carried  to  America,  No 
vember  30.    For  some  other  war  preparations  of  the  same  date  see  the  London 
Times,  December  2,  p.  7,  col.  6. 

2  In  the  Times  of  December  2  appears  a  notice  of  the  arrival  of  the  San  Jacinto, 
and  a  telegram  from  Queenstown  of  news  from  New  York  to  the  2oth,  but  no 
details. 


II 

dinner  given  in  Boston  on  the  evening  of  November  26.  They 
were  printed  in  the  Boston  papers  of  November  27,  only 
three  days  before  the  eventful  3oth. 

The  only  possible  question  remaining  is,  whether  the  English 
preparations  for  war  might  have  ceased  after  November  30, 
say  December  12,  had  not  the  news  of  this  Boston  dinner  and 
other  rejoicings  reached  the  British  Government.  There  are  no 
indications  that  such  is  the  fact.1  Though  Boston  is  the  "hub 
of  the  universe,"  it  was  not  for  Great  Britain  the  centre  of 
diplomatic  influence;  and  I  doubt  if  these  speeches  would  have 
had  any  more  influence  in  England  than  a  speech  of  the  mayor 
of  Birmingham  would  have  had  with  us;  but  at  all  events,  even 
supposing  that  the  British  Government  would  have  ceased  its 
preparation  for  war,  cancelled  the  orders  for  arms,  ammunition, 
and  cannon,  stopped  work  at  her  arsenals  and  on  her  ships,  re 
called  her  troops,  and  let  the  saltpetre,  etc.,  go  to  the  United 
States,  news  of  this  supposed  change  of  attitude,  had  it  taken 
place,  could  not  have  reached  Washington  before  the  Cabinet 
decision  made  December  26. 

As  to  other  happenings  in  the  eleven  days,  news  of  the  reso 
lution  of  the  national  House  of  Representatives  thanking  Wilkes 
passed  December  2,  was  first  published  in  England  December 
17;  and  that  of  the  half-approval  and  half-disapproval  of 
Gideon  Welles,  Secretary  of  the  Navy,  dated  November  30, 
had  not  reached  London  by  December  20. 

The  London  Times  of  December  3  and  4,  after  hearing  of  our 
"  rejoicings,"  shows  that  the  New  York  Tribune,  the  chief  United 
States  Government  organ,  suggested,  and  the  New  York  Commer 
cial  Advertiser  advised,  returning  the  envoys.  The  London 
Times  editorials  of  these  two  days  were  more  stirred  up  by  the 
absurd  fictions  from  its  own  New  York  correspondent 2  than 

1  The  London  Times  of  December  u,  saying  there  was  no  news  from  the 
United  States  later  than  November  25  (the  day  before  the  Boston  dinner  to 
Wilkes),  still  speaks  of  "war."    The  preparations  had  been  going  on,  though  the 
London  Times  of  December  9  speaks  of  "a  rapid  subsidence  of  bluster"  in  the 
United  States.     For  example,  the  transport  Australia,  engaged  December  5, 
took  on  some  troops  for  Canada  December  n  and  12. 

2  The  editorial  in  the  London  Times  of  December  3,  says:   "The  news  shows 
that  the  Federal  public  and  forces  have  received  their  Commodore's  exploit  with 
considerable  misgivings  as  to  consequences.  .  .  .  Some  portion  of  the  New  York 
press  discovered  immediately  the  weakness  of  their  case."    It  then  goes  on  to  speak 
of  the  "violent  acts  of  four  boats'  crew  of  American  seamen,"  and  "these  cutlass- 


See  table  of  Dates  of  Events,  page  20  infra. 


12 

by  the  actual  statements  in  the  United  States  papers.  The 
London  Times  editorials  show  manifest  unfairness  in  handling 
the  material  of  its  own  news  columns.1 

There  seems  to  be  "  nothing,"  then,  "  that  called  for  a  menace 
of  war";  news  reaching  England  December  3  could  not  have 
caused  the  action  of  November  30;  and  Mr.  Adams'  whole 
argument  on  this  point  falls  to  the  ground. 

In  justice  to  Lord  Russell  it  should  be  stated  that  on  this  same 
November  30  he  addressed  a  second  private  letter  to  Lord 
Lyons,  saying,  "if  asked,  you  will  say  that  you  desire  to  abstain 
from  anything  like  menace." 2 

This  letter  was  never  shown  to  Mr.  Seward,  and  the  fact  of  a 
menace  of  war,  the  demand  for  return  and  apology,  and  the 
seven-days  limit  were  all  that  were  known  to  our  Cabinet. 

An  explanation  for  the  hurried  despatch  of  troops  to  Canada 
has  been  attempted  of  late  years  on  behalf  of  Great  Britain, 
namely,  that  this  was  the  ordinary  manoeuvre  of  troops  to 

and-pistol-bearing  Judges  of  the  American  Admiralty,"  and  of  a  rumor  that 
"  Captain  Wilkes  is  reported  to  have  said  '  right  or  wrong,  these  men  had  to  be 
rescued,' "  as  far  worse  than  the  seizure  itself.  As  a  matter  of  fact  the  envoys  were 
taken  off  with  the  least  possible  show  of  force,  and  the  Slidell  family  had  so  testi 
fied  at  the  official  hearing,  November  27;  but  the  London  press  preferred  to  be 
lieve  the  absurd  and  unsustained  stories  of  Commander  Williams,  who  had  been  in 
charge  of  the  mails  on  the  Trent,  as  to  how  he  had  thrown  his  body  in  front  of  the 
Yankee  bayonets  to  save  the  life  of  the  helpless  Miss  Slidell.  The  New  York 
correspondent's  story  which  the  Times  swallowed  whole  and  repeated  editorially 
was,  "that  the  seizure  of  the  Trent  is  but  the  first  of  a  series  of  similar  acts;  that 
steamers  are  being  fitted  out  at  New  York  for  the  express  purpose  of  committing 
similar  outrages  upon  our  flag;  that  they  have  been  designedly  entrusted  to  the 
command  of  *  young  officers,'  and  that  those  '  young  officers  '  have  been  author 
ized  to  exercise  great  latitude  in  the  execution  of  their  instructions  and  have 
received  assurances  in  advance  of  the  support  of  the  Government." 

1  Though  on  December  3  it  prints  some  extracts  from  New  York  papers  that 
favored  giving  up  the  envoys,  in  its  editorial  of  December  4  it  purports  to  fur 
nish  a  summary  of  the  Northern  press  and  quotes  only  such  passages  as  were 
hostile  to  Great  Britain. 

2  This  menace  existed  in  fact  if  not  explicitly  on  paper.     Joab's  words  to 
Amasa  as  he  smote  him  in  the  fifth  rib  were,  "Art  thou  in  health,  my  brother?" 
(Congressman  Thomas  of  Massachusetts,  Harris,  228).    But  after  all,  this  second 
letter  may  show  that  Lincoln  rightly  applied  to  the  situation  his  story  of  the  two 
quarrelsome  dogs  on  opposite  sides  of  the  fence  who  on  finding  an  unexpected 
opening  instead  of  attacking  each  other,  turned  and  ran  away.    Harris,  186.    As 
against  England  there  was  the  sudden  appearance  of  two  Russian  fleets,  one  in 
San  Francisco  and  one  in  New  York,  friendly  to  the  United  States,  with  sealed 
orders  to  be  broken  only  in  case  of  war  between  Great  Britain  and  the  United 
States.    Russia  was  still  smarting  from  her  defeat  in  the  Crimean  War,  for  which 
England  was  so  largely  responsible.    Harris,  209-210. 


13 

Canada  about  that  time  of  year.  In  reply  it  should  be  stated 
that  large  numbers  of  extra  troops  had  been  sent  to  Canada  the 
previous  summer.1  The  order  was  for  thirty  thousand  men  of 
the  best  fighting  regiments  of  England  (far  beyond  the  usual 
quota) ;  and  the  hurry  in  sending  troops  at  this  time  was  so  great  / 
that  the  Persia  was  taken  off  her  regular  passages,  and  among 
the  transports  used  was  an  American  side- wheeler,  the  Adriatic, 
bought  and  so  hastily  fitted  up  that  even  the  American  flag  on 
her  paddle-box  was  not  painted  out.  To  show  the  spirit  in 
which  the  troops  left,  a  military  band  on  board  one  of  the  trans 
ports  played  "  Dixie,"  the  favorite  Southern  tune.  The  justifi 
cation  of  England's  threatening  attitude  having  failed,  then, 
let  me  state  that  Mr.  Dana's  notes  on  Wheaton  in  1866  only 
recorded  what  all  the  authorities  at  the  time  felt,  and  all,  I 
believe,  except  Mr.  Adams  in  his  recent  paper,  have  felt  since, 
that  England's  course  in  this  matter  was  unfriendly  —  some 
calling  it " bullying"  —  and  certainly  a  departure  from  the  usual 
methods  employed  in  diplomacy  in  such  a  case  as  this,  which 
would  be,  even  when  the  rules  of  International  Law  were  more 
clearly  broken,  to  call  the  attention  of  the  Government  to  the 
facts,  assume  that  the  act  was  done  without  authority,  ask  for 
an  explanation,2  and  only  threaten  war  as  a  last  resort,  perhaps 
after  refusal  to  arbitrate,  never  as  the  first  step.  As  Mr.  Harris 
has  shown  in  a  most  conclusive  manner  in  his  The  Trent  Affair, 
the  ruling  class  of  Great  Britain  was  intensely  hostile  to  the 
North,  beginning  with  the  letter  of  Lord  John  Russell  of  Feb 
ruary  20,  1 86 1,  which  came  like  a  bolt  from  a  clear  sky  after  the 
unusually  friendly  relations  following  the  visit  of  the  Prince  of 
Wales  to  the  United  States  in  1860.  This  letter  of  Lord  John 
Russell  was  most  remarkable  for  its  insulting  language.  It  was 
written  two  weeks  before  the  inauguration  of  Lincoln,  and  says, 
"Suppose,  however,  that  Lincoln  acting  under  bad  advice  should 
make  political  capital  out  of  blustering  demonstrations,"  the 
British  patience  "might  be  tried  too  far."  Then  there  followed 
a  series  of  articles  in  the.  papers  and  magazines,  speeches  by 
Lord  Palmerston,  Lord  John  Russell,  Gladstone,  and  others, 

1  Harris,  61. 

2  Dana,  Wheaton,  653  »;  Harris,  271.    In  case  there  was  a  mistake  compensa 
tion  would  be  expected  as  well  as  return.     See  also  Declaration  of  London  (1909), 
Art.  64. 


/ 


14 

attacking  the  Northerners  and  showing  confidence  in  the 
success  of  the  Southern  cause.1  Lord  Coleridge  told  me  that 
in  those  days  a  dinner  party  he  attended  in  London  was 
up,  because  some  one  took  the  side  of  the  North. 

The  ruling  class  in  Great  Britain  were  in  truth  hostile  to  the 
North  and  ready  to  be  stirred  up  to  warlike  measures  at  the 
first  excuse,  and  the  Trent  affair  was  prized  as  such. 

On  the  same  day  that  the  news  of  the  Boston  dinner  was 
published  in  the  American  papers,  Mr.  Seward  wrote  from  Wash 
ington  a  letter  to  Adams  in  London,  stating  that  Wilkes  acted 
without  the  knowledge  or  authority  of  the  United  States  Gov 
ernment,  and  that  the  Government  was  ready  to  consider  the 
whole  matter  fairly.  To  show  the  spirit  in  which  the  British 
Government  was  acting,  though  the  Government  press  had  been 
constantly  stating  that  the  act  was  authorized,  and  indeed,  part 
of  a  plan  of  Seward's  for  insulting  Great  Britain,2  no  denial  was 
made  from  the  Foreign  Office,  and  the  truth  only  came  out  in  a 
roundabout  way  later.  In  addition  to  this,  it  now  appears 
that  Miss  Slidell,  who  was  among  the  Trent  passengers  who 
carried  the  first  news  to  England  November  27,  immediately 
told  the  British  ministry  that  the  American  officer  who  boarded 
the  Trent  took  pains  to  state  that  the  commander  of  the  San 
Jacinto  had  no  instructions  from  his  Government,  but  was 
acting  on  his  own  responsibility.3  We  know,  too,  that  the 
original  draft  of  Lord  John  Russell's  letter  as  submitted  to  the 
Queen  and  the  Prince  Consort  was  so  hostile  in  its  form  that 
the  Prince  Consort  insisted  upon  its  revision,  —  the  last  public 
act  in  the  life  of  that  noble  man.  We  do  not  know  the  exact 
contents  of  the  original  draft,  but  we  have  learned  that  it  had 
the  words  "wanton  insult."  The  Queen's  suggestions  were 
adopted  in  the  main,  but  couched  in  language  less  courteous 
than  hers. 

1  Harris,  17-59;    Morley,  Life  of  Gladstone  (1903),  69-86;    Life  and  Corre 
spondence  of  Lord  Coleridge  (1904),  n.  1-5. 

2  This  was  based  on  some  misunderstanding  by  the  Duke  of  Newcastle  when 
he  was  in  the  United  States  in  the  Fall  of  1860.    He  related  how  Seward  told  him 
he  was  about  to  have  a  very  high  office  in  the  Federal  Government,  "and  it  will 
become  my  duty  to  insult  England,  and  I  mean  to  do  so."    This  story  was  con 
stantly  repeated  in  the  London  press  and  believed  generally. 

3  Lothrop,  William  H.  Seward,  299.    This  statement  of  Miss  Slidell  was  not 
known  to  Mr.  Harris  in  1896,  when  he  wrote  his  admirable  book  on  The  Trent 
A/air. 


15 

Mr.  Adams  suggests  as  justifying  England's  threat  of  war 
and  her  peremptory  and  offensive  demand  some  American 
examples,  one,  the  course  adopted  towards  the  United  States  of 
Colombia  in  respect  to  the  independent  Republic  of  Panama 
and  the  Panama  Canal.  In  the  light  of  recent  research,1  we 
trust  this  will  never  be  considered  a  precedent  for  anything 
in  the  past  or  the  future;  but  another  instance  cited  by  Mr. 
Adams,  namely,  the  memorable  message  in  the  Venezuelan 
affair  which  President  Cleveland  directed  to  Great  Britain  on 
December  17, 1895,  is  worth  comparing.  Great  Britain  was  then 
at  peace,  in  possession  of  an  enormous  navy.  The  subject 
had  been  presented  to  her  time  after  time  in  diplomatic  mes 
sages,2  only  to  be  pigeon-holed.  There  was  immediate  danger 
of  war  breaking  out  between  Great  Britain  and  Venezuela 
which  might  arouse  a  war-cry  in  America  over  the  Monroe 
doctrine  and  Cleveland's  demand  was  for  arbitration.  To  make 
America's  attitude  in  the  case  parallel  to  England's  in  the  Trent 
Affair,  it  should  have  been  something  like  this,  —  that,  with  no 
previous  diplomatic  correspondence  on  the  subject,  the  United 
States  should  demand  in  seven  days  the  ceding  of  a  definite 
tract  of  territory  to  Venezuela,  on  a  threat  of  war,  at  a  time 
when  England  was  fighting  for  her  very  life,  let  us  say,  with 
Germany,  and  a  refusal  to  allow  the  matter  to  be  arbitrated. 
Indeed,  the  threat  of  war,  when  we  had  one  of  immense  pro 
portions  on  our  hands  already,  is  the  only  thing  that  has  given 
the  Trent  Affair  its  real  importance  and  differentiated  it  from 
the  hundreds  of  other  cases  of  the  exercise  of  the  right  of  search 
of  neutral  vessels  on  the  high  seas  which  have  continued  up 
to  this  very  day.3  In  the  present  war  between  Italy  and  Turkey 
there  have  been  several  including  the  British  steamer  Egyptian 
Prince,  going  from  Alexandria  to  Malta,  both  neutral  ports, 
January  2,  1912;  in  the  Chino- Japan  War  of  1894  there  were 
eighty-one;  and  in  the  Russo-Japanese  War  of  1904-1905  sixty- 
four  neutral  vessels  visited  and  searched.  In  two  instances 
in  the  present  war  between  Italy  and  Turkey,  persons  were 
taken  off  French  vessels  going  between  neutral  ports  without 

1  "  A  Chapter  of  National  Dishonor,"  by  Dr.  Chamberlain,  in  North  American 
Review,  February,  1912,  145-174. 

2  About  forty  in  all. 

3  Even  unlawful  acts  following  the  search  have  not  been  made  a  cause  of  war. 
Dana,  Wheaton,  653  n. 


i6 

causing  any  threat  of  war  or  unusual  preparations  for  it  by  the 
neutral  government  concerned.  It  was  the  disgrace  of  having 
to  yield  to  such  threats  that  made  it  so  hard  to  give  up  the 
prisoners;  and  whatever  may  be  said  of  the  great  length  of 
Seward's  letter,  its  sublimated  passages,  refined  reasoning,  and 
one  bombastic  sentence,  in  the  main  it  was,  as  most  authorities 
agree,  a  statesmanlike  paper.1  It  adopted  the  very  ground  sug 
gested  by  Mr.  Adams,  our  Minister  in  London,  by  Sumner  here, 
and  by  General  Scott  in  Paris,  that  of  giving  up  the  envoys  on 
the  understanding  that  it  was  a  moral  victory  for  America  in 
her  contention  for  greater  liberty  to  neutrals,  and  the  disavowal 
and  final  abandonment  by  Great  Britain  of  her  claim  of  right 
in  case  of  search  to  look  for  her  own  subjects  and  take  them  off 
the  decks  of  neutral  vessels.  This  chief  ground  for  the  surrender 
was  what  reconciled  the  Cabinet,  Mr.  Dana,  and  others  to  what 
otherwise  would  have  been  a  humiliation,  and  formed  the  chief 
theme  of  Sumner 's  great  speech  in  the  Senate  on  January  10, 
1862.  Strangely  enough,  this  point  seems  to  have  been  lost 
sight  of  in  later  times.  Mr.  Adams'  paper  passes  it  over,  though 
it  is  the  very  position  he  now  suggests  Seward  should  have  taken 
on  November  16, 1861,  or,  at  least,  on  December  12.  I  find,  too, 
in  such  good  recent  histories  as  that  of  Rhodes  and  Woodrow 
Wilson,  that  this  portion  of  Seward's  letter  is  not  referred  to. 
Harris  clearly  mentions  it,  but  hardly  gives  it  its  due  moral 
emphasis.  Moore's  very  full  Digest  of  International  Law,  though 
it  gives  all  that  part  of  Seward's  letter  which  leads  up  to  the 
final  sentence,  that  sentence  which  Seward  considered  the 
climax  of  the  whole  is  omitted.  The  last  portion  of  Seward's 
letter  reads  as  follows: 

"  This  Government  after  full  examination  of  the  subject  decided 
that  it  could  not  detain  the  persons  taken  from  the  Trent  by  Captain 
Wilkes  without  disavowing  its  own  liberal  interpretations  of  the  law 
of  maritime  war,"  and  then,  after  quoting  from  the  correspondence 
between  James  Madison,  Secretary  of  State  in  the  administration 
of  Thomas  Jefferson,  to  James  Monroe,  Minister  to  England  in  1804, 
regarding  England's  old  claims,  goes  on  to  the  climax:  "nor  have 
I  been  tempted  at  all  by  suggestions  that  cases  might  be  found  in 
history  where  Great  Britain  refused  to  yield  to  other  nations  and  even 

1  "Most  critics  pronounce  it  a  very  able  state  paper."  Harris,  221.  Lothrop, 
Seward,  313;  Bancroft,  Seward,  n.  253. 


to  ourselves  claims  like  that  which  is  now  before  us.  ...  She 
could  in  no  other  way  so  effectually  disavow  any  such  injury,  as  we 
think  she  does,  by  assuming  now  as  her  own,  the  ground  upon  which 
we  then  stood."  * 

The  reasoning  of  this  part  of  Seward's  letter  is  so  like  the 
editorial  in  the  New  York  Tribune  of  November  20,  quoted 
in  the  London  Times  of  December  3,  that  it  seems  as  if  this  edi 
torial  was  inspired  from  our  State  Department,  and  strengthens 
the  contention  that  Seward  favored  the  return  from  the 
beginning.2 

As  abandoning  forever  the  old  claims  of  the  War  of  1812,  we 
have  Lord  Russell's  letter  of  January  26,  1862,  in  which  he 
accepts  Seward's  claim  that  the  United  States  would  expect 
from  Great  Britain,  or  from  any  other  friendly  nation,  the 
same  reparation  in  a  similar  case.3  Lord  John  Russell,  in  an 
nouncing  the  surrender  in  Parliament,  made  no  mention  of 
the  real  grounds  on  which  it  was  made.  In  1875  and  1876 
I  frequently  visited  Lord  John  Russell  at  Pembroke  Lodge, 
and  I  had  the  audacity  to  ask  the  Earl  one  day  why  he  had  not 
stated  these  grounds  to  Parliament,  as  I  thought  such  a  state 
ment  would  have  very  much  allayed  the  ill-feeling  that  had 
been  aroused  in  America  over  the  affair.  Lord  Russell's  reply 
was  that  Seward's  letters  were  so  long  and  verbose.  Though 
the  answer  was  unsatisfactory,  it  was  a  warning  against  too 
long  preambles.  The  letter  has  something  like  ten  printed  pages 
of  preamble  before  the  climax  is  reached.  Had  it  consisted  of 
the  last  few  paragraphs  only,  with  the  rest  in  an  appendix, 
its  real  purport  could  not  have  been  hidden. 

1  Senate  Executive  Document,  No.  8,  2d  Session,  37th  Congress,  rv.  4-13.    Sew 
ard's  letter  is  not  printed  in  the  volume  of  diplomatic  correspondence  which  contains 
some  of  the  other  correspondence  on  the  Trent  Affair,  and  in  the  only  contemporary 
United  States  document  where  it  appears  it  is  so  badly  indexed  that  no  one  could 
find  it  without  knowing  previously  that  the  letter  existed  and  the  date  on  which 
it  was  written.    This  may  account  for  the  passing  out  of  mind  of  the  most  impor 
tant  part  of  Seward's  letter.     [The  letter  to  Lord  Lyons,  dated  December  26, 
1861,  will  be  found  in  War  Records,  Series  II,  n.  1145.    Ed,] 

2  To  be  sure  Seward  and  Horace  Greeley  were  at  sword's  points  politically; 
but  this  was  a  period  of  respite  in  their  quarrels.    The  New  York  Times,  personally 
more  friendly  with  Seward,  had  some  early  suggestions  of  the  surrender.    See  also 
Bancroft,  Seward,  n.  232-234,  where  it  is  maintained  that  Seward  was  against 
keeping  the  Southern  envoys. 

3  Executive  Document,  No.  46,  2d  Session,  37th  Congress,  ra.  3. 


i8 

London  Punch  gives  a  very  good  idea  of  current  history. 
The  first  issue  after  the  British  demand,  that  of  December  7, 
1 86 1,  represents  huge  Jack  Bull  threatening  a  small  Jonathan 
and  saying,  "  You  do  what 's  right,  my  son,  or  I  '11  blow  you  out 
of  the  water."  The  next  week  appeared  two  cartoons,  one  in 
which  Mr.  Bull  says,  "Now  mind  you,  Sir  —  no  shuffling  - 
an  ample  apology,  —  or  I  put  the  matter  in  the  hands  of  my 
lawyers,  Messrs.  Whitworth  and  Armstrong  "  (the  firm  manu 
facturing  and  supplying  cannon  for  the  British  navy).  The 
other  represents  Britannia  standing  on  a  war-ship  by  a  huge 
cannon  loaded  and  capped,  with  a  halyard  in  her  hand,  looking 
across  the  ocean,  and  underneath,  "  Waiting  for  an  Answer." 
On  December  28  Punch  pictured  "Columbia's  Fix"  —  "Which 
Answer  shall  I  send,  [Peace  or  War]?"  There  was  no  doubt 
from  this  and  from  the  London  Times  and  all  the  English  papers 
that  the  threat  of  war  was  clear  in  the  British  mind  from  the  very 
first  news  of  the  seizure. 

Now,  what  happened  after  the  surrender?  Had  it  been  gra 
ciously  received  on  the  other  side  with  some  due  recognition  of 
the  inconsistency  of  England's  attitude,  or  at  least  some  indi 
cation  of  her  willingness  to  come  to  the  American  point  of 
view,  it  would  have  done  much  to  make  friends  with  America. 
It  was  not  even  received  in  silence.  It  was  received  with 
taunts  and  abuse  in  the  press  and  by  the  public  men.1  Punch 
of  January  n,  1862,  had  a  cartoon  called  "Up  a  Tree,"  repre 
senting  a  coon  with  the  head  of  Lincoln  among  the  branches, 
and  John  Bull  pointing  a  loaded  gun.  The  lines  below  are  as 
follows:  "Col.  Bull  and  the  Yankee  'Coon.  'Coon:  'Air  you 
in  arnest,  Colonel?'  Colonel  Bull:  'I  am.'  'Coon:  'Don't  fire; 
I  '11  come  down.' "  The  true  cartoon  would  have  been  Jonathan 
fighting  for  his  life  in  a  duel  with  a  slave  owner,  and  John  Bull 
saying,  "I'll  stab  you  in  the  back  if  you  don't  stop  doing 
what  I  always  did  myself."  The  other  cartoon  was  "Naughty 
Jonathan,"  —Mrs.  Britannia  saying  to  Earl  Russell,  "There, 
John!  He  says  he  is  very  sorry  and  that  he  didn't  mean 
to  do  it.  So  you  can  put  this  back  into  the  pickle-tub  "  ("  this  " 
being  a  bunch  of  birch  rods).  This  unfriendly  attitude  did 
more  even  than  the  original  demand  to  stir  up  that  desire  for 
revenge  which  was  so  common  in  our  country  for  many  years 

1  See  Gladstone's  Edinburgh  speech,  January,  1862.    Harris,  235. 


19 

after  the  Civil  War.1  Good  Mr.  Longfellow,  who  had  sub 
scribed  for  Punch  from  its  beginning  in  1841,  closed  his  sub 
scription  with  this  volume. 

I  visited  Inverary  in  1875,  when  there  were  present  the 
Duke  and  Duchess  of  Argyll  (she  being  the  daughter  of  the 
celebrated  Duchess  of  Sutherland),  the  Marquis  of  Lome  and 
Princess  Louise,  Earl  Shaftesbury,  Lord  Edward  Cavendish 
(brother  of  Lord  Frederick  Cavendish  who  was  assassinated  in 
Phcenix  Park),  and  some  other  members  of  the  nobility,  all  I 
have  mentioned  by  name  being  friends  of  Sumner.  The  Duchess 
asked  me  how  it  was  that  Sumner,  who  had  so  many  warm 
friends  in  England,  became  so  hostile  to  the  country  during 
the  War.  I  gave  as  answer,  first,  his  regret  that  England,  the 
great  anti-slavery  country,  should  have  sided  with  the  South, 
and,  second,  an  outline  of  the  Trent  Affair,  with  some  of  the 
points  I  have  given  here,  presenting  to  the  Duchess  and  those 
about  her  an  entirely  new  view  of  the  case,  which  they  agreed 
did  much  to  explain  Sumner 's  state  of  mind. 

Perhaps  it  is  better  to  bury  England's  attitude  in  forgetful- 
ness  for  the  sake  of  friendship  with  her  and  the  peace  of  the 
world;  but  if  we  do  call  it  to  remembrance,  let  us  recall  it  cor 
rectly,  and  if  we  do  bury  it,  let  us  not  write  on  the  tombstone 
"  Justified/'  but  rather  "  Forgiven." 

1  James  Russell  Lowell  has  written:  "The  laity  in  any  country  do  not  stop  to 
consider  points  of  law,  but  they  have  an  instinctive  perception  of  the  animus  that 
actuates  the  policy  of  a  foreign  nation." 


20 


DATES  OF  EVENTS. 


On  the  West  Side  of  the  Atlantic. 
1861 

Nov.    8     Trent  stopped  and  envoys 
taken  off. 

1 6  (Sat.)  The  seizure  known  in 
the  U.S.  Brief  statement 
only  in  Sat.  p.  M.  papers. 

1 8  First  rejoicings  appear  in 
U.  S.  papers. 


27  Speeches  of  Boston  dinner 
to  Wilkes  of  evening  be 
fore,  first  published. 


Dec. 


30  Letter  of  Welles,  Sec'y  of 
Navy,  to  Wilkes. 

2  Resolutions  of  U.  S.  House 
of  Representatives  thank-' 
ing  Wilkes. 

12  News  of  England's  hostile 
attitude  first  reaches  the 
U.  S. 

18  Lord  Russell's  demand 
reaches  the  U.  S. 

20  The  same  presented  to 
Seward. 

26  Letter  of  Seward  to  Lord 
Lyons  delivering  up 
Mason  and  Slidell. 


1862 

Jan.  9  Sumner's  speech  in  the  Sen- 
nate  sustaining  the  re 
turn  of  the  envoys. 


On  the  East  Side  of  the  Atlantic. 

Nov.  ii  Private  letter  of  Palmerston 
to  Delane  stating  U.  S. 
would  have  a  right  to 
take  off  Mason  &  Slidell 
under  English  precedents. 

27  Seizure  first  known  in  Eng 
land.  Liverpool  indig 
nation  meeting  3  p.  M. 

30  Lord  Russell's  peremptory 
demand  for  surrender 
and  apology  in  seven 
days,  or  English  ambas 
sador  to  remove  from 
Washington,  and  war 
preparations  in  Great 
Britain  begun. 

.Dec.  3  First  news  of  rejoicings  in 
U.  S.  appears  in  London 
Times. 


.12  News  of  Boston  dinner 
speeches  first  appears  in 
London  Times. 

(Letter  of  Welles  to 
Wilkes  does  not  appear  in 
Times  at  this  period.  It 
must  have  been  kept 
private  at  first.) 

.17  News  of  the  resolutions  of 
the  U.  S.  House  of  Rep 
resentatives  of  Dec.  2 
first  appears  in  London 
Times. 


